Rhodactis help please

janet · Jan 21, 2011

Hi
I have had my marine tank upi and running for a year now. Last weekend I bought a rock with some beautiful green rhodactis on. The large one however doesn't look very well. It's centre is covered in light brown slime (the slime looks like my bubble tip anemone slime when it's excreting it's waste products). Is this normal in rhodactis? Do I need to do anything. The other green rhodacis on the same rock all look fine.
thanks
Janet

nivram · Jan 21, 2011

Sounds like it is not happy. Possibly releasing zooxanthellae from stress. Do you have a picture of the slime. What you describe seems like what I've seen mushrooms do when i've dropped rocks on them (by accident) or tried to propagate them. I think it will ultimately be fine as long as nothing is bothering it and it is receiving the right amount of light and current.

janet · Jan 22, 2011

I have just discovered my cleaner shrimps are eating it! It has almost totally gone this morning! That is the most expensive fish food I have ever bought!
Janet:squigglemouth:

Steve W · Jan 23, 2011

They wouldn't have eaten it if it wasn't dying, more than likely. I suspect that if you got it at a LFS they were running thier salinity way too low. A lot of them do that to save money on salt and to theoretically keep fish diseases down, then when you bring it home and put it in your tank the shock is too much, and they get to sell you another one. If you buy anything else from them, check the salinity before you aclimate it. If it is below 1.024, do your aclimation very slowly adding a few milliliters at a time and take 4 to 6 hours to aclimate it.

Another possible problem with Rhodactis is if the light change was too great they will sometimes croak. I put all mushroom types in a shady spot under my rocks for at least a week before moving them out into the light.

janet · Jan 23, 2011

The rhodactis killer was a Eunice (bobbit) worm! I saw him coming out of one of my live rocks today. I took the whole rock out and broke it up. There in the middle was a Eunice worm. Thank goodness he is out!

aalvarado87 · Feb 2, 2011

its amazing the pests you find in your tanks. did you at least get to save some of the shrooms. I am sure they have skin left on the rocks and will grow back. I had a rock that lost all of its shrooms and low and behold they all came back twice again. So don't throw the rocks out as the shrooms will grow back.